It was the first trek inside a national park for me. I was told by our dear friend Vijay Mohan Raj ( DFO, Sirsi ) that it would be a special trek for all of us. It was supposed to be special because of the terrain - high altitude grassland it was. Ofcourse there were shola forests covering the mountain like green patches too.

It was on November 1st that we all reached Joida forest guest house. VMR joined us from Karwar around 5:00 PM. It was a superb view of back waters of Supa Dam from the guest house. We had some mouth watering snacks in the evening talking about various things that included wildlife, photography and even about our professional lives. As I hit the bed, I was eagerly thinking about the trek that we are about to do the following day.

We left the guest house the next day by 6:15 AM and started towards the taralu peak. It was an hour's drive from the guest house. Best park of Uttara Kannada district, especially Sirsi-Yellapura-Dandeli-Anshi region is that these places are blessed with emerald green carpet of pristine rain forests. Driving along these roads is a different kind bliss in itself. We hit a junction where we took a right turn and entered a muddy road. We were in a 4X4 vehicle with couple of forest guards . VMR started to explain us about various kinds of flora and fauna present in the region and it was quite an experience for me and my dear friend Anil who was my accomplice for the trek.

After about couple of kilometers, we came to a halt where VMR spotted Jungle Wagtail. It had perched on the muddy tracks and was enjoying its morning feed. VMR made some images of it. Jungle wagtails are birds that are not easily seen everywhere and it was a lifer for me too. Drive through this narrow muddy road was a superb experience in itself. Jungle on either sides, morning warm sunlight kissing the forest floor like beams of divine rays is a different feel altogether. Since these are rain forests, most of the sunlight is absorbed by the canopy leaving the forest floor cool, moist and dark. Rain forests cover only a small part of earth's surface - as little as 6% but it nourishes almost two-thirds of all the plants and animal species on the planet! Most fascinating aspect of these rain forests are that, there are still quite a lot of species of flora and fauna are undiscovered. Since the undergrowth is tremendous and highly infested by snakes and leeches, these forests are extremely impenetrable.

We crossed couple of sholas and something caught the eyes of one of the forest guard. It was tiger scat! VMR took some photographs as evidence and we reached a place where the grasslands began to emerge. Few meters down the track and there was a splendid view of the summit. It took us about 3 hours to reach the summit. It was not because of the difficulty pf scaling the hillock but we started to make lots of images of landscapes that we were experiencing.At one stage the elevation was too much and I had never ascended such a place ever before. By noon we were at the summit and what a view it was! Endless hills and sholas everywhere. Distant blue haze of hills on one side and shimmering backwaters of supa dam on the other - a view to cherish for a long time! We started the decent after spending few minutes at the summit and we were finally at the foot hills in about 1.5 hours time.

Trek was of fairly easy to moderate difficulty levels but the experience was exhilerating. High altitude grassland is something that we had never experienced before and this was a wonderful treat for our senses. After a fantastic lunch in Joida forest rest house we packed our bags and left to Sirsi to embark a journey to Bangalore.